[Air-l] internet research and confidentiality

[Thomas Koenig]

Selon "Mark D. Johns" <johnsmar at luther.edu>:

> At 04:03 PM 12/21/2004, Thomas Koenig wrote:
> >If, under such circumstances, sociologists have any doubt whatsoever
> about
> >the need for informed consent, they consult with institutional review
> >boards or, in the absence of such boards, with another authoritative
> body
> >with expertise on the ethics of research before proceeding with such
> research.
>
> The ASA guidelines you quote are actually very consistent with the AoIR
> guidelines.

Sure, they are, but they are also consistent with a number of other
guidelines, since they are less specific.

> In the portion excerpted above, they indicate that there may
> be
> ambiguous situations that require careful thought and negotiation with
> the
> IRB.

And I agree on that. But there is nothing ambigious to me about, if a
non-password protected blog, whose link is published, a website with a
published link or a Usenet posting is public.

The AoIR guidelines are far more specific and too restrictive here. They
say, when it comes to the determination of what is public and what is
private one should ask questions like:

"Is there is a posted site policy that establishes specific expectations –
e.g., a statement notifying users that the site is public, the possible
technical limits to privacy in specific areas or domains, etc."

That to me is a too high of a demand. Should you only be allowed to quote a
journalist, if he or she states somewhere in the paper: "I am aware that
the New York Times is available at low cost to the general public.
Therefore I waive my right to privacy."?

What matters for me, is not assumptions or expectations, but the mere fact
that something is obviously publicly available.

> Beyond this quote, the ASA guidelines go on to be more restrictive
> about the study of populations at risk.

And they name the poulations at risk: Children, immgrants, mentally ill
persons. I am unsure about immigrants, but, of course, children and mentally
ill do deserve special protection.

> Your focus on only the first
> sentence, permitting study in public, is a highly selective reading of
> what
> you have quoted. They do not imply that one can go do whatever one wants
> in
> research.

And neither did I.

> As others have pointed out here, blogs are not all the same and there are
> various circumstances in which a blog -- or other internet site --may not
> be entirely "public."

And I agree.

> Because the original post on this question did not
> detail the circumstances, it is simply irresponsible to tell the person,
> "hey, go ahead, it's all public," without knowing all of the facts. It
> may
> be the case that the material is public, it may not be.

When I hear "blogging" I assume, it is an unprotected webblog. What leads
you to the assumption that it is not? Oriana would surely have mentioned
this detail, as it seems obvious to me that password-protection might lead
to different considerations.

> But I would never
> recommend that another researcher simply do what I have done without
> knowing to what degree the situation is the same. To do so assumes that
> "one size fits all."

I did not make an explicit recommendation, but I just gave the guideline:
"Chances are, your webblogs are fair game when it comes to national laws.
Your IRB or professional association may still see it differently." The
AoIR guidelines seem to imply: "Chances are, you will have a hard time to
establish if webblogs are private or public."

> Yeah, and I want Santa to bring me a new Porsche for Christmas.

Good luck on that one. :-)

> we as researchers
> don't simply get to wish for the rules by which we conduct research -- we
> have to live with the rules governments and institutions lay out for us.

Yes, I agree, but I still have not seen any national laws, which would
relegate the typical webblog to the private sphere.
--
thomas koenig, ph.d.
department of social sciences, loughborough university, u.k.
http://www.lboro.ac.uk/research/mmethods/staff/thomas/index.html